The Birds and the Bees
by Sound Reason
Summary: This one is hard to summarize in a few words. All I can say for sure is there will be ZADR and there WILL be a successful, full term, live birth MPREG. You know the drill, don't like, don't read.
1. Chapter 1

Checking... nope. Still don't own it. Rats.

The Birds and The Bees

Chapter One

"Whatcha doin', Masta?" said Gir, munching on his breakfast, a chocolate bubble gum muffin.

"I am putting the finishing touches on my most INGENIOUS plan yet, Gir," replied Zim, pacing up and down the kitchen, so excited that each time he forgot his wig and contacts lying on the counter. "The Dib worm will not know what he has been hit with! AH HAH HAH HAH HAH HAH!"

Gir swallowed the last bite of muffin and smiled a smile that crinkled his blue eyes. "I LOOOVES big-headed boy!"

Zim slapped himself on the forehead, shaking his head. "Gir. How. Many times. Do I have to. Go over this with you? The filthy Dib monkey is our ENEMYYYY!"

Gir jumped up on the seat of the chair, stooped down and spun around on his head. "I LOOOVES emenies!"

Zim sighed. He didn't have time for this. He really didn't have time. For one thing, it would help his plan greatly to get to skool well before the bell rang, and for another, if he got detention for being late he would be prevented from unleashing the full amazingness of his plan on the Dibmonkey! Explaining their mission and the threat the Dib posed to it would have to wait until another day.

Zim gave the day's instructions to his robot before heading off to skool, throwing his head back and laughing loudly enough for the whole street to hear him. This was going to be a very good day for ZIM! He had a plan to embarass the Dib monkey beyond all belief...

At about the same moment, Dib marched confidently toward the skoolyard, a smirk on his face and a glint in his eye. This would be the day he would capture Zim once and for all, thereby saving the world. Or at least make Zim look like a total idiot in front of everybody, which was almost as good.

Dib told Gaz to have a good day as she walked away, head down over her Game Slave, before anybody could see her with that raving idiot.

Dib ignored the teases he got as he crossed the skoolyard. They didn't know Zim was an alien, they didn't know he, Dib, was the hero of the earth. They didn't know anything. If he could capture Zim before the bell rang, he would know he was going to have a good day.

Just then, the alien detector Dib had in his pocket began to vibrate like a cell phone. Dib turned around quickly, and sure enough, Zim was now stomping onto the skoolyard.

Dib's pulse quickened with excitement. Oh, which of his many weapons should he use first, the alien sleep cuffs? Or the handheld taser? Or the pepper spray? Perhaps the wire lariat? Or the water pistol?

He had been watching the alien obsessively ever since the day when Zim joined the class and by now, knew what Zim was going to do before the alien himself knew.

And what happened when Zim saw Dib was the last thing Dib had expected.

"DIIIIIB!" shrieked Zim, throwing out his arms as if to hug him, as he began to run towards Dib instead of away from him which he usually did. "COME TO ME YOU FILTHY EARTH WORMBABY!"

Dib was too surprised to do anything for a moment. He was quite unprepared for something like this! Never before had Zim run toward him instead of away, and certainly Zim had never pushed out his lips as if he had wanted to-

"I WILL KISS YOU STINKBEAST!" Zim screamed. "I WILL KIIIIISS YOOOOOOOU!"

Dib's legs finally began to move, and he turned around and fled as fast as he could go.

Zim chased Dib all around the skoolyard, through the playground full of pointing, laughing children, and through the busy parking lot, holding out his arms and smacking his lips loudly the whole time.

Dib ran as fast as he could, ran in panic and in horror. Not only was Zim chasing him instead of the other way around, but Zim wanted to... kiss him? This wasn't the way it was supposed to be!

Dib was relieved beyond words when the skool bell finally rang, and he pushed through the line of children entering the skool, Zim making sure to run just as fast not to get lost in the crowd as the lines of filthy pigsmelly giggling earth children closed in all around them.

Even the disapproving eyes of the teachers wasn't enough to make Zim stop chasing Dib. He kept trying to get close to Dib even as Dib did his best to keep well away from the alien.

Dib's voice echoed desperately off the lockers as he ran down the hall screaming, "Whaaaaaat's goooiiing oooooooooon?"

(I got another idea and just wanted to make sure I got this chapter up before Christmas. I don't know when I'll get the chance to update, or come to that, IF I'll update. Barely anybody read my other fic, Christmas Spirit, THANK YOU SHADOWY DOOM! so please let me know if I should write any more about this.)


	2. Chapter 2

(Note: I thought I'd gone back a long way on this site to read previous fics before posting any of my own, but somehow or other I missed andalitebandit's fic on an apparently similar topic.

I am so embarrassed! I didn't mean to make the title and the first chapter so much alike! The rest of it is quite a bit different; I just had to make some changes to Chapter Two, and of course the title.

This chapter is for you, andalitebandit, for being so good about this coincidence!

Whew. )

Chapter Two

Dib stumbled into his desk, panting, as Zim took his own seat on the other side of the room. Giggles kept rippling across the room. When Ms. Bitters slunk into the room the giggles were hastily muffled, but never quite silenced altogether. Indeed they kept threatening to break out in to a tidal wave of laughter.

Dib took out his book and hid his face in it, wanting more than anything to sink through the floor even if it did mean ending up in the underground classroom. Zim saw this and rubbed his hands together gleefully. So far, his plan was working splendidly. Of course he knew it was going to work splendidly. How could it do anything else, for was he not ZIM?

Every time Dib raised his hand to answer a question, his eyes would drift of their own accord across the room to Zim, who sat staring at him, which would unnerve Dib so much he would forget the question. Ms. Bitters would tell him he was doomed to flunk, drop out of skool and end up living on the streets begging for spare change outside a MacMeaties someday and the kids would all laugh without trying to hide it this time. Unlike Zim, who it never seemed to bother in the least when Dib watched him, Dib was becoming more and more unnerved by this.

It was one weird lunchtime. Dib kept his head face down to avoid the amused stares of his classmates. Every single time he looked up from his lunch it was to see Zim still staring at him from across the room, and he hastily turned back to his lunch. Dib was so quiet that sitting next to him, Gaz raised an eyebrow when Zim waved to Dib; even stranger was the fact that Dib didn't rattle off theory after theory like he usually would have every time Zim moved a muscle.

Finally Zim walked toward the garbage cans to throw his lunch out after pushing it around his tray enough to make it look as if he had eaten some of it. He was watching Dib the whole time. Dib followed him with his eyes, hoping Zim would just give up and finally leave him alone. But the afternoon was a repeat of the morning.

As soon as the bell rang at the end of the skool day, Dib resolved to just go straight home and stay there. He just wanted this weird, weird WEIRD day to be over. But even before Dib stood up next to his desk, Zim leaped out in front of Ms. Bitter's desk to cut him off from the door.

Dib feinted as if he was about to go around the back of Ms. Bitters's desk, but Zim wasn't fooled and very nearly caught Dib as he scooted toward the doorway.

Zim turned on his heel and gave chase. He chased Dib through the doorway, down the hall and out the front door. Dib took a desperate shortcut behind the dumpsters, but it was here that Zim caught him, tackling him around the legs the same way he'd seen the players of feetball do it on TV.

Dib fell heavily onto his face with a grunt and Zim's long spider legs shot out to pin him down. "I've got you now, Dib human!" The words sounded more frightening than Dib had ever heard them sound before. He knew there was no escape now and a wave of a horrible sickening feeling shot through him.

Screams tore across the skoolyard as Dib's pants were pulled down; the kids all heard it but didn't care. Then it dawned on some of them that they could watch Dib having something funny and horrible being done to him. One by one they started running over to the dumpster.

Whatever had happened, it had been quick; Zim was now sitting there with a smug look on his face and pulling on one of his gloves; Dib was pulling up his pants and rubbing his rear end, fiercely avoiding everyone's eyes.

Had anyone caught a glimpse of Dib's face, they would have seen it was as red as a tomato, and a solitary tear of burning humiliation was sliding down his cheek. This was the worst day of his life. At least it would soon be over.

Desperately Dib fled the skoolyard, leaving the cruel and callous laughter behind as fast as he could, and caught up with Gaz on the way home. She raised an eyebrow at him but said nothing; Dib wasn't about to tell her what just happened and for once he was glad she barely ever spoke to him.

Dib shivered, trying to blot out the memory. This looked like a very good day for doing a lot of online work on his computer. At least the house would be empty, except for Gaz. At least that much would be normal.

But what they saw when they got home was the last thing either of them expected to see.

(Anybody want to guess what that was? A cookie for the closest guess.)


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

But when they opened the door, their father was there to meet them. And this time it wasn't just on the hoverscreen, but in person.

They both wondered what was wrong. Neither Dib nor Gaz had been expecting to see their father again for a month at least; he was away somewhere cloning a hairy nosed wombat or something.

"Children, I just realized I have omitted a very important part of your education," he began, more awkwardly than usual. "This experiment of which I am currently heavily involved in planning reminded me to tell you something. Sit down, please. It's... it's... it's time..."

The Professor took a deep breath. "It's time you knew where you came from."

"We came from skool," said Gaz, deadpan as ever. She wasn't joking or even being sarcastic. It was as if she couldn't quite believe her father was actually gracing them with his presence.

"If this is about the birds and the bees," Dib said, "I already know... but we can compare notes." Privately, he thought his father was late with this information, but time with Dad was time with Dad.

"Son!" the Professor scolded. "The skoolyard is a hotbed of misinformation, rumors, lies and half-truths!"

"That's not how I know, Dad."

The Professor looked surprised, as if Dib couldn't have found out any other way.

"I looked it all up on an online medical encyclopedia when I was home sick with the flu one day last year. I finally got bored of reading about the flu and common childhood diseases, so I looked up something else."

The look on Gaz's face said she already knew too, although how she'd found out was, like most things about Gaz, to remain a mystery.

They tried to tell him they already knew, but as usual the Professor didn't hear them and went into extensive, abundant and lurid detail, describing the process as if he was lecturing a class of morbidly sadistic medical students instead of explaining the facts of life to his own children.

From morning sickness, sore nipples and swelling breasts, to frequent trips to the bathroom, backaches, itchy skin and stretch marks, proceeding to beachball sized bellies to conclude with very precise descriptions of labor pains, he left out nothing.

As the Professor's spiel progressed, Dib went green around the gills and gulped several deep breaths, frantically pressing his legs together. Though thankful beyond words that this would never happen to him, he was nevertheless squicked beyond belief. Gaz just scowled, longing to beat up the man who would someday cause her to go through that.

"... and then, in the final stage of childbirth, the placenta, a large, mucous-covered bag of blood and blood vessels, tears free and comes out of the-"

"Dadstop... " Dib begged, squirming and looking as though he was about to puke any second.

"Is there a problem, son?" the Professor looked puzzled, or as puzzled as it is possible to look behind thick goggles and a lab coat covering his mouth. "This is beautiful! This is where babies come from! This is where YOU came from!" He turned to Gaz. "Daughter, I bet you can't wait!"

Gaz clenched a fist and boldly struck a blow for all women everywhere, square on Dib's nose. "OW Gaaaz!" he whined. "What was that for?"

"For being a boy."

I thought at first there was a lot of interest in this story, but the reviews seem to have slowed down. I checked tonight, and the cookie goes to... INVADER AQUA! No, make that two cookies... you were absolutely correct... on both counts! How on earth did you know? This is downright scary... did you hack into my computer?

No. You get THREE cookies... for being so nice about it too!


	4. Chapter 4

This chapter is a really short one, but I'm really busy these days. I WILL finish this!

Chapter Four

"And do you know what happens next?" said the Professor breathlessly.

"The mother and father take the baby home and they all live happily ever after," said Gaz, without much enthusiasm.

The Professor stopped motionless in mid-word. "How'd you know?"

"We already knew all this," Dib said, still holding onto his stomach with one hand and his nose with the other.

The Professor lowered his rubber-gloved hands. "Why didn't you tell me you knew it?"

"We did tell you," said Gaz, lifting an eyebrow.

"Then why did I have to tell you all this?" Membrane once more lifted his hands as he stroked his hair zigzag in astounded frustration.

"You didn't have to tell us, but you wouldn't listen when we told you we knew it and you told us all again anyway." Dib was beginning to look more comfortable again. He was once more sitting up straight and had stopped rubbing his stomach and covering his nose.

If Dib and Gaz had looked bored, that is, looked bored enough to have fallen asleep, The Professor just MAY have figured out that he wasn't telling them anything new. However, embellishing his story had worked against him. In spinning a tale in far more vivid, more lurid, and in more excruciating detail than any online medical encyclopedia, skoolyard conference, or any other more mysterious source would ever have, he had guaranteed that Dib and Gaz would have looked anything BUT bored. So he kept on talking, pouring on more and more details as he did so, which had caused his audience to show more and more of a reaction.

"Did I leave anything out?" the Professor now asked.

"No, I think you got it all."


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

As soon as their father left to return to the lab, Gaz gritted her teeth, none too happy with the state of things. She leaned over and punched Dib once more.

"Ow!" said Dib. "What was that for this time? Why do you keep hitting me Gaz?"

"If I have to go through that and you don't, I'm going to make you hurt in OTHER ways."

She grabbed her game and threw herself into it to blast something.

Dib suddenly remembered what had happened that afternoon, and shuddered, blushing afresh with the embarrassment. Quickly he jumped off the couch to go upstairs to do his homework, and while he was at it, get a little ahead. He would do anything to forget today ever happened.

--page break--

The next morning, Dib woke up feeling so sick that he felt sure he was going to vomit. He had the uneasy feeling that he'd had a nightmare, a particularly confusing, horrible nightmare that had lasted the entire night. Then he remembered. Oh yeah, that stuff Dad told us... He shuddered and jumped out of bed quickly, as if to leave those nauseating sensations behind him.

The feeling soon passed. However Dib knew he would have to return to school and face... ZIM...

Walking to skool next to Gaz, Dib remembered how Zim had chased him yesterday and wondered...

Immediately he pushed the idea out of his mind. No. No way. That was not only impossible, it was too sick to even think about...

Dib walked onto the skool playground a lot more cautiously than he usually did. Gaz walked away, but this time she didn't go as far away as she usually did. She sat down on a bench not far away. Was it his imagination, or was she surreptitiously watching him from under her eyebrows?

A cluster of kids were huddled next to the wall of the skool, whispering excitedly, but they hastily hushed at his approach, turning to watch him suspiciously.

Okay, so this was a little unusual. Usually the other kids paid him no attention at all unless it was to hurl an insult at him.

One of the kids slapped his hands together, sending a hot arrow of embarrassment through Dib's gut, and as if on cue the whole gang erupted in laughter. Okay, so they WEREN'T treating him any differently than usual.

Dib quickly turned toward Gaz, but she too was laughing, or rather snickering, right along with everybody else. She never talked to anybody, and Dib hadn't told her about his ordeal, but even SHE had heard what had happened the day before.

Great, just great. He couldn't even count on Gaz.

Dib turned away as his face burned with shame as he remembered what had happened the previous day. He would never be allowed to live this down, ever.

Mpreg in the next chapter. Yes, I promise!


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

Dib cast an anxious eye up the street toward the direction Zim usually approached from. Sometimes he approached from the other direction, for no other reason than just to make Dib paranoid, he knew it, he just knew it...

Why was the alien taking so long today? Not, of course, that Dib actually WANTED to see him. He shuddered.

With no Zim to exchange insults and threats with, Dib fought to keep his mind from drifting back to the previous afternoon. It wasn't easy. He began counting backwards by 7s from 99, he tried reciting the Greek alphabet, anything... and the next thing he knew, his mind was drifting back, back to the previous evening...

_When Professor Membrane had finished telling them where babies come from, Dib and Gaz sat on the couch looking at their father, and their father stood there looking at them. An awkward silence hung between them for a moment, until Dib thought of something he did want to know._

"How did you learn THIS much about it?"

Professor Membrane, man of science, threw out his chest with a dramatic flourish of a rubber gloved hand. "Wait until I tell you about THIS!" Enthusiastic once more, the Professor took a seat on the other end of the couch and rearranged his lab coat until he was comfortable. He cleared his throat and once more began a long spiel, beginning with the early days of his scientific career, when he had newly opened his own lab... 

As he did during all coffee breaks nowadays, the Professor stood next to his cabinet, once more checking through his long list of supplies even though he knew every item on it by heart. By now there was just one more thing he needed. He had just ordered from a biological supply house in another state because it was the closest one that had even heard of them.

Now he studied his list carefully, trying not to look at either the clock or his watch every 30 seconds. If there were to be any deliveries that day, the courier always came between 11:07 and 11:45.

It was now 11:38.

For weeks, everybody in the lab had tried to talk him out of it, but he refused to listen. They all kept telling him it was unnatural, against nature, a monstrosity... but through it all, Membrane kept insisting that it would not only work, it would be a resounding success. "Tell me what could be more natural," as he loved to put it, "than NATURAL childbirth?"

Though everyone else in the lab was convinced this would never go amount to anything beyond mere talk, Membrane kept insisting it would work.

He had studied the subject, had studied it thoroughly. He had researched actual cases in which babies were gestated by mothers with defective wombs, partially removed wombs, no wombs at all. In at least one case that he knew of, the fertilized egg had completely missed the opening to the Fallopian tube; the baby had attached itself to the outside of the womb and developed there.

No longer was it mere speculation. Membrane had completed a long series of experiments. He had begun with seahorses, the species with the most unique reproduction method on earth. From there, he had worked up to fruit files, then frogs, then mice, and then pigs.

Finally he was ready for the next step, an experiment with a human subject. But he could find nobody who was willing to volunteer. He put ads in the paper and went to men's liberation groups. All agreed that it was a fascinating idea, and lent it their full support in theory, but as for allowing it to be done to themselves... they all quickly enough crossed their legs and said no thanks.

Membrane wasn't surprised. In any event, he was prepared. Through it all, he had been treating himself with hormone injections to prepare his body to gestate a baby. He would use his own sperm, of course, but whose egg would he choose? The female lab technicians all looked around at each other nervously until one of them, looking much relieved, remembered an earlier attempt to create a test tube baby that had ended abruptly with the mysterious disappearance of the mother.

This mystery woman had been a member of Mensa, the society for supergeniuses. From what anybody could remember, she had studied computer programming and done gymnastics in her spare time. She had had brown eyes and purple hair and was skinny to the point of anorexia. Someone remembered something about a collection of exotic pets. Almost immediately somebody had nervously mispronounced the word "donor" as Donna, and that was the name she came to be known as from then on.

Sure enough, a search of the cryopreservation unit turned up the egg. This sparked a lot of nervous jokes about finding one more egg in the fridge and how fresh they were, who wanted theirs sunny side up, etc.

"Package for Profe - "

Membrane all but attacked the courier signing for the package.

Coffee break ended early for everybody that day.

He held high the item he had waited for for two endless days. It was THE ultimate, state of the art invitro fertilization workstation, and quizzed the entire staff on the procedure. By now, they could recite it in their sleep, and they were so bored with being drilled on it that they were practically doing just that.

Membrane swiftly scanned the room before snapping a brisk, "Well let's get started! Nothing's stopping us now!" Only slowly did it begin to dawn on them one by one that finally, all of Membrane's wild talk was about to become reality.

Nervous looks once more darted around the room. Who would actually get to assist with this?

"I will," a voice squeaked. The Professor's oldest and dearest male friend stepped forward. He was a nerdy looking geek with pimples and a long neck. He also had long, thinning frizzy red hair and a woolly beard. Beneath a lumberjack shirt, he was wearing checked pants that were much too short, ending in odd socks under a dirty, frayed lab coat.

A few minutes later, they came out of the examining room, both looking as embarrassed as if they'd been caught necking or something in there. Everybody turned out the lights and they all went home, nobody speaking to each other. They wondered how long they would have to wait to see if this would work.

They didn't have long to wait. The next day Professor Membrane burst through the doors of the lab so suddenly that everyone jumped.

"WE'RE PREGNANT!!" He crowed exultantly, holding up the stick he'd peed on that morning. A wave of excitement shot through the lab; everybody ran up to him as soon as they could put down their instruments. There were handshakes all around, and kisses from the female technicians.

Everyone seemed to have forgotten their old misgivings and doubts about the procedure. Now that it had been proven to be possible, nobody wanted to be remembered as ever having said that it was impossible.

"Congratulations!"

"You did it!"

"Not yet I didn't! There's still gestation, labor, delivery - "

"Oh Membrane! Loosen up and celebrate! Let's all go out after work!"

"Yayyy!!"

Everybody left work early that day to raise a bottle at the local pub.

"To the baby!"

Ironically, Professor Membrane was the only one who couldn't drink. He was pregnant.

---

The excitement wore off quickly. After a couple of weeks of being high-fived by everyone as he entered the lab each morning, Professor Membrane began coming in with a sour look on his face. He was hungry because he had not been able to eat any breakfast and his face was as green as if he had recently thrown up.

Frequently he bumped into people in his hurry to the bathroom, at which he would grimace, not in annoyance or anger, but in pain. This was weird, as usually he made a joke of colliding with people, if he ever noticed it at all.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" cried a pretty young assistant named Brenda, hastily backing away from the Professor. "Are you okay? I didn't hurt you did I?"

"My tits!"

Only then did Brenda look down and notice that he DID in fact have tits. They were small and flabby, but there they were! The next thing she noticed was wet stains dribbling all down the front of his lab coat from where the nipples would be. Brenda backed away still further, a sickly look plastered on her face. Things were starting to get weird around here.

---

Professor Membrane was lying on the examining table. He was glad of a chance to lie down, as he had been very tired lately. A fluffy pink blanket with kangaroos on it primly covered his swelling hairy belly.

It was recommended to have regular prenatal examinations, but the Professor worked in a lab, was surrounded by qualified lab technicians and was a medical pioneer on top of that, so he got a prenatal exam every day!

In the next room his colleagues tossed a coin to see who got to examine him. Membrane didn't know it, but he would be examined by whoever LOST.

Logan, the chosen lab technician, came into the room. He was a young, good-looking and dark-haired recent graduate of the local medical skool. He took a deep breath before holding a stethoscope to the Professor's swelling hairy belly. It was already bigger than it was the last time he'd drawn the short straw. When he held a stethoscope to the belly this time, Logan's eyes widened.

"I hear TWO heartbeats!" he gasped.

"TWO heartbeats?" echoed the Professor.

"Yes, two h... No THREE!!! Three heartbeats!!"

The Professor gave a loud crowing whoop and a dramatic fist pump. Then he started to cry, and finally he punched out Logan for not telling him sooner.

---

Somewhere in his fifth month, the Professor switched to a maternity lab coat, and by now he found it more comfortable to wear no trousers, a habit he kept to this day.

As everybody else relaxed over coffee on their breaks, the Professor would gorge himself on pickle sundaes. The morning sickness had subsided, fortunately. He had been hoping he wasn't one of those who would have to endure nausea for the full nine months. Though gaining weight rapidly, he was less tired. Everyone told him he looked radiant.

Suddenly one afternoon, the Professor froze with his spoon halfway to his mouth; everybody else froze as well. What was it? Was something wrong? Was it premature labor??

Suddenly the Professor relaxed and began to rub his thick, pudgy, preggy, hairy tummy. A broad smile ran across his shady face; by this time of the day, he had five o'clock shadow. "The baby kicked!" he explained. He looked down at his swelling belly suddenly. There had just been another kick on the other side.

The ultrasound proved that there were indeed two babies in there. One was moving a lot and seemed to be happy for some reason. The other baby didn't seem to appreciate all the activity and kept moving as if trying to get away, but of course it had nowhere to go.

"Stop that!" said the technician, but of course the active baby couldn't hear. It kept moving as if it was dancing, and the other baby went to hit it but didn't even have enough room to wind up to take a punch. Finally it settled down sulkily, and seemed to be staring resentfully at the dancing baby.

---

Back pain. Cramped, swollen feet. Calcium pills. Braxton-Hicks contractions shot through the Professor regularly as his body prepared for labor. Once again he was waddling to the bathroom a lot. There was so much kicking, lots and lots of kicking! The Professor often said he would be glad when the babies were out and able to kick each other instead of him. His big hairy preggy belly got bigger and bigger by the day. It looked like it was going to burst. This wouldn't be over soon enough for the Professor.

One day in the Professor's ninth month, his colleagues were holding an impromptu get-together in the lab after work. Everyone was standing around all talking at once with increasing excitement when all of a sudden the Professor uttered a loud cry and fell against the table, knocking over a bottle of ginger ale and splattering it all over the floor.

"His water broke!" shouted someone.

Everyone ran in all directions at once. "Boil water!" shrieked the Professor's best friend, jumping up and down, his Adam's apple jumping up and down too. "Boil water! Boil water! Boil water! Boil water!"

Eventually everybody collected their coats in a heap on the floor for the Professor to lie down on. Brenda took off her watch to time the contractions, and Logan held his hand. He shrieked aloud every few minutes, and the time between contractions grew less and less, his lab coat grew more and more stained with blood.

As the Professor lacked a uterus, labor didn't last long, only a couple of hours.

The first to be born was Dib, albeit by only a minute or so. He held out his arms to everybody as if he was greeting old friends. Gaz already looked pissed off at the world and everything in it, as if put out that she hadn't been born first.

They all got together for a group photo, to commemorate the happy and historic occasion, with all the scientists in rows behind and to either side of the Professor. Membrane, with sweat all through his hair and his five o'clock shadow, looked as though he had just run a marathon... only happier. He was holding Dib in his right arm and Gaz in his left.

Membrane could have opted to give birth by caesarean section, but in the interests of science, chose to undergo full labor and delivery. He remained sore for a long time, and this was the time he had stopped wearing pants. As he had never been seen wearing anything but his lab coat over everything, barely anybody had ever even noticed.

_The Professor beamed down at the creased and faded photo he had taken from his wallet to show them. "And that, my children," the Professor finished, "is where you came from!"_

Dib just stared at him. Gaz looked disgusted, although it was hard to tell whether she was looking more or less disgusted than she usually did.

"Did you... did... you... " Dib was wondering if they had been breast fed, although he was unable to get the question out.

"Yes I did," the Professor announced proudly. "I invented my own baby bottle and baby formula just for you two!"

Dib sighed with relief.

"I called you 'Dib,' Dib," said the Professor. "'D. I. B.' stands for 'Dad Incubated Boy'."

"And me?" demanded Gaz.

"I was going to call you 'G. A. S.' for 'Girl Also Successful,' but they heard me wrong and spelled it that way on the deliv- uh, birth... certificate. Or they pointed out to me what it would look and sound like. Or maybe both. I forget which."

Gaz now looked less pleased than ever, now that her original name was Gas, and that it had also been spelled wrong on top of that.

"So we're twins? I'm NOT older?" Gaz fumed. An even less pleasing thought occurred to her. "I'm an AFTERTHOUGHT?"

She now punched Dib in the face... and Dib, now aware that he was no older than her, punched her right back in the same spot.

"DADEEEEE!" Gaz screamed, too shocked and horror-stricken to do anything else. "Did you see that? He... he... he HIT me! WAAAAAHHH!!!"

An all too familiar voice interrupted Dib's reverie, and he looked up to see that Zim had just appeared on the edge of the playground.

"Long rambling proclaimation of DOOOOOOM!" he crowed, right before he turned and saw Dib. An expression of disgust came over his disguised features and he began frantically shaking his hand as if trying to flick all his fingers off, then yanked off his glove and frantically whipped his other palm with it. "Dibstink! Dibworm! Dibstinkfilthyhumanwormbaby! You got germs on ZIM yesterday! Filthy human GERRRRRRRRRMS!"

Dib wanted to remind Zim that what Zim had done to him was far worse, but was too embarrassed to mention it.

At that moment, Sara joined the group, and Jessica held out her hand. "Pay up."

Sara tried to say she had bet that Zim would NOT try to kiss Dib, but Jessica was having none of it. "You said he WOULD try to kiss him. Everyone here is a witness. Aren't you guys?" There were solemn nods of assent all around the little group. "And I said, 'Pay up.' Now pay up."

Dib had snapped his full attention to this little knot of kids at the mention of Zim's name, so there was no way he could avoid hearing his own. So that was what this whole thing had been about!

"Whose idea was this?" he shouted angrily.

Everybody finally looked at him, and as one, all burst into laughter.

"That was great!" shrieked Zita, the first one to be able to speak again. "We tricked Zim into kissing you yesterday because we knew BOTH you freaks would hate that!" She joined all the rest in laughing again. "So tell us, which one of you hated it more?" Everyone, including Zita, laughed even harder.

Dib could feel his face getting hot. It was now all coming back to him in bits and pieces, his fevered brain racing through yesterday's images like shaking hands sifting through incriminating snapshots... the mocking threat of a kiss, the undignified struggling behind the dumpster, his pants being roughly yanked down, Zim yanking off that glove and shaking it in his face, that single, sharp, stinging slap...

All his embarrassment vanished in an instant as a blinding rage rolled in to take its place.

Dib balled his hands into fists, his books and skool equipment dropping unheeded to the ground. He stooped down to pick up one item, just one item, his ruler.

Dib always had been partial to metal rulers.

Now his breath came in ragged gales through savagely gritted teeth. His eyes narrowed to slits of rage as he glared at Zim, mentally drawing crosshairs over the sickly green face he despised so very, very much. He would repay the indignity of yesterday. He would give Zim such a resounding thrashing on his OWN bare bottom that the alien would never forget it.

With a howl of fury, Dib tore off chasing after Zim; once more he was the pursuer. Zim fled, screaming, "Go away from ZIM filthy human! You are covered in filthy human germs! Go away go away GOAWAYYYY!!"

At long last, things were back to normal!

The End


End file.
